Disneyland Paris in February

Without a doubt, it's going to take me into the summer to get caught up in the blogging world!  I've got a long list of blog entries, but I don't foresee a chance to just sit down and pound them out, so for starters, here is our week long vacation to Paris from back in February!!!!

 

Paris is just a hop, skip and a jump down the road (less than 4 hrs to our hotel!) and we lucked out on gorgeous weather for February...brisk, but sunny every day!  Our original plan was to go in March, but once Leevi's deployment popped up he had a training to go to during that time.  We were able to cancel the week at the timeshare, but were, in turn, given pretty tight stipulations.  A week was available during February so we jumped on it and changed Hailey's birthday plans to Paris (not too shabby!)   

 

 

We found 4-day park hopper tickets to use among the two parks and spent a day in the city.  It was a pretty awesome week!!! 

 

 Since we had already been to Paris recently, the only thing Hailey really cared about seeing was the Eiffel Tower.  We were game for that plan!

 Two of these fancy cars (I'm sure Leevi could tell me what they were but I don't remember) were offering rides for 50 euro.  You just needed a drivers license and you could drive it for 10 minutes!  BUT every time a police car drove by, the guys hid their sign...too funny!!

 There was a small park near the base of the tower, so we stopped and played a bit before making the 30 min drive back to the hotel. 

 Downtown Paris, by car!  Notice that in the bottom right picture that there are no lines marking the lanes....people just made their own lanes and merged in and out when needed!!!  Yikes!!!

 Hailey's birthday fell on the Wednesday that we were there so we celebrated at Disney and then cake and presents back at the hotel. 

 How did she get so old??!!!

 A few pics from the resort...it was a Marriott Vacation Club....two story condo with 2 bedrooms, 2 1/2 baths, full size kitchen, living room, dining room, and laundry. I packed meals for the week to save money and we didn't have to eat out once.  (Of course I had to take a picture of the bidet in our bathroom...the girls thought it was a little kid sink!!!!!  And I love the picture on the bottom left of the girls snuggled so close in such a big bed!) 

 Out the back door of our condo was a pond...one morning I took the girls out there before we left for the day and Mr. Luke pried the door open and followed us...Daddy was on it though! 

Disneyland Paris apparently doesn't compare to Disney in the States, but since we don't have personal experience there, Paris was just fine!  When we went about a year and a half ago over Thanksgiving weekend, we only spent one day at Disney and only at one park, so we knew that we needed a little more time to cover both parks.  Thankfully we did because the UK was on holiday and the crowds were absolutely insane!!!!!!!!!!  We thought we'd breeze through there in mid-Feb but we were mistaken!!  Ugh!!!  It was quite painful, BUT the sun was shining...had it been unbearably cold or rainy, it would have been torture!!  The hardest part was tag-teaming with Luke...Leevi and I felt like we didn't see each other all week because so much time was spent apart waiting in lines!!! 

 We did get to see quite a few characters though and get their autographs...

 Getting ready for one of the three parades... 

 The Sword in the Stone...Luke really had a tight grip and wouldn't let go when Leevi picked him up! 

The most painful wait, yet rewarding experience was meeting Belle!  We waited TWO AND A HALF PAINFUL HOURS!!!!  At the start of the line, the sign showed a 90 min wait and we debated whether or not to enter, but it was our last day at the park (we had put it off other times because it was over an hour wait) so the girls wanted to wait....Leevi and Luke found something to do and we waited, and waited, and waited!!!  We had no idea who we were waiting to see other than we knew that there were two princesses and we'd get to see one of them.  It was pretty frustrating because the line would stop for over 10 minutes at a time (while the princesses switched out!) and there were no bathrooms and not much inside to keep them entertained.  There must be politics behind the reason why they can't have all of the actresses in one big line and have us just go down the row!!!  Seriously, why can't they just hire 20 girls to be Belle!!!!???!!!! 

We wrapped around a castle corridor...I was even sitting on the floor by the end!!!

The top left picture is priceless because these were their faces before we turned the corner into our own personal room to meet the princess....we had no idea it was Belle!  My heart jumped for joy for Kai, but dropped at the same time for Hailey (I wasn't sure if Hailey would be sad that it was her birthday and she didn't get to see Ariel!)  But both girls were super excited and Belle took her time talking to the girls and were weren't rushed out (no wonder it took sooooooo long!!!!!!)  As we were leaving, I peeked into the other room to make sure the other princess wasn't Ariel because I totally would have begged and pleaded to anyone to allow Hailey to see Ariel on her birthday!  (It was Tiana)

 Luke and I killed a lot of time warming up in the Disney Playhouse theatre!  It was a puppet show with Little Einsteins, Winne the Pooh, the Mickey Mouse Club and Handy Manny.  We saw the shows in English and French! 

The Studios park had some pretty awesome thrill rides and the girls went on everything that they were tall enough for...I don't know how they are so brave!!!  Another favorite was the Crush Coaster which is an inside roller coaster from Finding Nemo...super fun...we would have done it over and over if the line weren't an hour each time!!!!!  Hailey was tall enough for the Aerosmith roller coaster and that was practically the only thing that had a wait time of about 10min (literally EVERYTHING else was at least 45 min!!!!!!!!) 

 And some fun video clips.....I'm having trouble uploading them from my computer and YouTube isn't being very helpful either, so to not drag out this post any longer, I'll go to the good ole cut and paste method! 

The parade...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G_lJUdanR4Q&feature=share&list=UUaBqgwXsY3rPAsNnSstIwSQ

Random clips...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WSTloHQDoyI&feature=share&list=UUaBqgwXsY3rPAsNnSstIwSQ

The laser night show...so awesome!!!!!!!!!!!!!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rOn0XNp0Tk8&feature=share&list=UUaBqgwXsY3rPAsNnSstIwSQ